Page 36 of Rainwater
He strode into the cottage, leaving the door open because as soon as this was done, he was getting on his bike. He was going to get far away from them both, before he hurt them, before they found out what kind of monster they had given their trust.
He stopped in front of the canvas and just started at the soft brush strokes, the beauty of what he had depicted. The coalescence of all he had ever wanted since he’d first laid eyes on Jennifer Horn.
He stood before the canvas and felt deep, tortured pain and ruthlessly he squashed it.
Banished it to somewhere else as he’d done as a child, though as an adult, he knew that the pain never went away until it was dealt with.
Later, when all he had to comfort him were elusive, sensual memories of Jennifer, of holding her, of the sheer beauty of finding a woman he could be friends with as well as a lover.
And always the dream would haunt him. And before him was the dream.
His most coveted wish brought to aching life.
His arm raised as he looked at the masterpiece that sat before him.
He knew he was good, but that didn’t seem to assuage the dark acid-like pain.
He was even better than his father. That was what he had told him.
You inherited my skill. You inherited my weaknesses, as well. You’ll grow up to be just like me.
Just like me . He closed his eyes, fear rising out of a dark, deep fissure in his heart.
With a clarity that was terrifying, he saw Jennifer’s face bruised and battered.
His heart squeezed with tight, unrelenting agony.
He stiffened and cried out, the picture shattering in his mind.
Destroy this and destroy himself. He didn’t want to be like his father.
The knife came down and her hand closed around his wrist, stopping the very tool of his destruction. “No, Corey.”
“Yes,” he said hoarsely, knowing that he could easily break her hold. He could easily hurt her with his superior strength. He could shove her away and continue to do what he must.
He didn’t want to be like his father, who had hurt his mother countless times and who had beaten him, telling him over and over again how much he was like him.
“No, Corey,” she repeated. She didn’t look at him because she needed this unsteady anger.
She knew if she looked at him it would dissolve along with her determination.
Instead, she looked down at the first painting that hadn’t been slashed to ribbons.
She looked down at true genius, true and genuine artistry.
Smooth, masterful blending of colors gave the painting a rich, lifelike quality so that the people in it seemed real.
It was the most beautiful painting she’d ever seen, touching her in a place that ached for him.
Tears scorched the backs of her eyelids. Scalding tears that wanted to fall. But she couldn’t…she wouldn’t let him see her this way. Calmness and tenderness were what he needed now.
She looked at the canvas again and was so very glad he hadn’t had a chance to destroy this painting.
It was a beautiful replication of the three of them, and she smiled through her tears at the perfect copy of Two Tone sitting in Ellie’s lap.
Ellie looked straight out at her, but the Jennifer in the painting was looking at Corey and he at her.
His left hand was on her face and the turquoise band on the third finger of his left hand made her breath catch.
“Corey…” The sob caught in her throat. “This is what you were destroying? Why?”
His face twisted in pain and he bit his lip until it bled.
“It’s fantasy, Jennifer. Just pure fantasy.
” He looked like a wild thing, his eyes wide and unfocused.
It scared her and she felt a chill. What would he have done this time after he’d slashed the painting? The thought sent shivers up her spine.
“This is what you want, isn’t it? To be part of us?”
“Yes,” he whispered, then in the next breath denied it.
“No. No.” His anguished voice beat the air like birds’ wings and she heard the sheer desperation in his words as if denying what he’d just told her was the only thing that would keep him alive.
His hair whipped around his face as he ripped his wrist from her grasp and knelt to pick up the knife.
When he rose, the dark determination on his face scared her.
He’d been doing this over and over again.
Destroying his dream, his hope, and in that instant she realized how much he must love her and Ellie.
How much it hurt him to do this. She couldn’t let him.
“No! Corey, please,” she cried, and stood in front of the canvas, reaching for his face.
Drawing him down, she kissed his mouth, tasted the coppery tang of blood, the stark fear and the seething anger.
He tried to avoid her, but she held him firm.
“I love you, Corey. Ellie loves you. We both love you so much. Don’t do this to yourself, please. ”
He jerked against her at her words, a sob catching in his throat. “I don’t deserve you.” His voice cracked, his chest expanding in ragged agony.
“The hell you don’t. I’ve never met anyone more giving, more beautiful.” She kissed him again and tasted the salt of his tears. “I love you. I’ll only ever love you.”
“Jennifer,” he crooned, his hot seeking mouth capturing hers. A violent shudder coursed through him as her hands caressed his face, moving along his firm jaw, sliding deeply into his hair. “I can’t. I don’t know how.” His voice broke, the words rushing over her lips.
She grabbed handfuls of his shirt and shook him.
“Of all the stubborn… Corey, what do you think you’ve been doing?
You taught Ellie to barrel race, you held her on her birthday when she was upset over her father, you shared your own experiences with her, you’ve supported me, stood by me, protected me and saved my life.
You’ve fed Two Tone, you’ve taken us to the dinner and the movies.
What do you think all that is? It’s being a family. ” She shook him again for emphasis.
He pulled away from her to look in her face. She could see how much he wanted to believe her. His eyes closed and his throat worked spasmodically.
Her hand clasped the one with the knife.
She could feel the trembling of his body where her fingers were wrapped around his hand.
She reached up and very gently pried his fingers from the handle of the knife.
He put up no resistance. His hand stayed open as if waiting to be filled, waiting to be needed.
She dropped the knife, slipping her hand into his, and he closed his fist around her almost painfully. She drew him up the stairs into the bedroom and began unbuttoning his shirt. He didn’t protest. It was as if the fight had gone out of him, as if all of him had finally drained away into nothing.
“ Jennifer ,” he drawled softly, leaning his head against her forehead while she stripped his shirt from him.
Then she looked up and over his shoulder and her breath caught in her chest. Strong emotion clogged her throat with a rawness that left her feeling as if some protective layer had just been peeled from her body. It was another canvas, but the picture depicted was not of the three of them.
He sat on his motorcycle with her completely naked straddling his lap.
In the painting, stark tenderness ravaged his face as his desire-filled dark eyes watched her moving over him, savage gentleness outlined in the long smooth fingers of his hands where he clutched her hips.
And she could almost hear his words. “I’m hurting for you, darlin’. Give me what I need.”
His naked leg was delineated with heavy thick muscles bunched in seductive male beauty as he used it to anchor both of them on the bike.
Then she looked at herself in the painting.
Is this what she looked like in his eyes?
This sensuous, breathtaking, wild woman with a mane of blazing hair falling down her back?
Her lips were parted as if she was crying out her release into the night sky.
The painting stirred intense emotions in her that she hadn’t believed possible.
Emotions she couldn’t even begin to name.
It aroused her with a rush of heat and honey.
In the portrait, her head was back and her eyes closed as she absorbed the sensations he was stroking in her. Her face was rapt with love for him.
Her voice was unsteady and thick with tears when she was finally able to speak. “Corey, my God, it’s beautiful.”
He didn’t know what he expected her to say.
Wondered while he was creating this replication of his most erotic fantasy, whether she would find it crude, disgusting, dirty.
He closed his eyes, realizing that she had found it none of those.
In her eyes, he realized he could do no wrong.
It pushed the darkness back, the need to destroy evaporated.
She made a little sound so soft he would have missed it if he weren’t in such harmony with her body, with her feelings. “Don’t. Dear God, don’t cry, Jennifer. I’ll come apart.”
She went back to removing his clothes and when his body was bared, she pushed him onto the bed, then went into the bathroom and retrieved a bottle of lotion from the medicine cabinet. She returned to find him lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling.
“Turn onto your stomach,” she ordered. He complied without any protest and it wrung her heart. She straddled his hips and finally, he said, “Jennifer, you don’t have to.”
“Shh,” she scolded and poured a generous amount of lotion onto her hands. With soft sure strokes, she worked out the kinks in his shoulders, kneading his hard muscles, trying to loosen all his aches and pains. She worked her way down his back, her hands gentle and reassuring.